Environment and Planning A 2008, volume 40, pages 108 ^ 130 DOI:10.1068/a3994 Landscapes of disaster: water, modernity, and urban fragmentation in Mumbai Matthew Gandy Department of Geography, University College London, 26 Bedford Way, London WC1H 0AP, England; e-mail:
[email protected] Received 16 March 2006; in revised form 14 July 2006 Abstract. The city of Mumbai is undergoing a complex social, economic, and political transition into an increasingly fragmentary and polarized metropolitan space. The tortuous flow of water through contemporary Mumbai presents one of the most striking indicators of persistent social inequalities within the postcolonial metropolis. We find that the city's dysfunctional water infrastructure has its roots within the colonial era but these incipient weaknesses have been exacerbated in recent years by rapid urban growth, authoritarian forms of political mobilization, and the dominance of middle-class interests within a denuded public realm. It is argued that the water and sanitation crisis facing Mumbai needs to be understood in relation to the particularities of capitalist urbanization and state formation in an Indian context. Introduction ``Cities like Bombayönow Mumbaiöhave no clear place in the stories told so far that link capitalism, globalization, post-Fordism, and the growing dematerialization of capital.'' Arjun Appadurai (2000, page 627) ``The nature of the municipal tap is feudal and bureaucratic ... .You left the tap open before you went to sleep. When the water sputtered and splattered at three, four or five a.m. and sometimes not at all, was when your day began.'' Kiran Nagarkar (1995, pages 69 ^ 70) In a dusty office of the municipal buildings in B ward in downtown Mumbai there is a detailed map of the Paris water supply system placed under a sheet of thick glass on the desk of the chief engineer.